snydeq writes: "Deep End's Paul Venezia questions whether server virtualization technologies are contributing to the decline of real server administration skills, as more and more sysadmins argue in favor of re-imaging as a solution to Unix server woes. 'This has always been the (many times undeserved) joke about clueless Windows admins: They have a small arsenal of possible fixes, and once they've exhausted the supply, they punt and rebuild the server from scratch rather than dig deeper. On the Unix side of the house, that concept has been met with derision since the dawn of time, but as Linux has moved into the mainstream — and the number of marginal Linux admins has grown — those ideas are suddenly somehow rational.'"

I'd argue against the mainstream portion of that. It seems the fault lies with the management of those employees. Lower quality employees are allowed to stagnate in high pay entry level positions. They aren't pushed to learn or grow beyond their initial skillset. As I've seen with most companies lately, once you walk in the door, the pay rate you signed on at is all you'll ever see. Responsibilities may be inherited, but rarely is training given other than "go figure it out".